As the Republican primary field narrows — eventually to a single candidate, the question of leadership is front and center for anyone paying attention to politics. Unfortunately, the majority of the electorate is paying attention to pretty much anything else. We’ve become comfortable with the idea of installing a savior, reformer, an avatar of hope and change, or of making America great again.
Politics is far removed from most people’s lives, or at least they think it is.
The framers of the Constitution could have easily structured the document to concentrate power in a chief executive. In fact, there were elements of the Continental Army, and some leading political figures of the day, who proposed installing George Washington as America’s first monarch. When you put politics in terms of monarchy, or another form of totalitarianism, Americans naturally bristle; perhaps, these days to a lesser extent than in the recent past.
Americans have become largely apathetic to the part they must play to preserve the civil liberties to which they only pay lip service. Americans have become content to place their faith in a political leader — a knight in shining armor. What most seem to forget is that the Constitution is preambled with the words “We the people.”
The 2020 presidential election cycle left many Americans cynical about the electoral process. Tens of millions of Americans sincerely feel that their votes didn’t matter, that the election wasn’t a win for........